Made By A Fabricista: Comfort Dressing with Style

As 2021 draws to a close, I don’t think it comes as a surprise that comfort dressing is here to stay, at least for a while. Now the definition of comfort dressing is different for all of us, and for me it means knits. However, I don’t always want to be in yoga pants and tees.

That’s why I chose to sew a knit skirt and top using Vogue 1820. This two-piece ensemble gives me the comfort of yoga pants but in a more stylish way.

The beauty of this design is that you can mix-and-match prints and/or solids, creating a one-of-a-kind look. Fabric Mart Fabrics has a multitude of knits to choose from at any given time which made it easy to choose coordinating fabrics.

I knew I wanted to use prints in a monochromatic color scheme. To find the five fabrics needed, I started by browsing the knit section on Fabric Mart’s website. I knew I wanted black as my base color.

As I found fabrics I thought would coordinate, I put them in my shopping cart. That way I could look at the shopping cart and easily visualize if they would work together.

I put more in my cart than I needed and deleted ones that didn’t look like they would work, ending up with five that had variations of black, white, gray and a hint of pink.

Because I wanted this look to be soft and flowy, all of the fabrics I chose were rayon or modal jersey knits. Three of the fabrics were panel prints, which worked beautifully as there are so many pieces to this look. Since I used a panel print for the skirt, I did measure the skirt pattern piece before ordering the fabric to verify it would fit.

The skirt has side front pockets, an elastic waist with a separate waistband and two rows of elastic. The bottom ruching is created with an elastic casing also. Both use 1” wide elastic (which you can find in the Sewing Room section on Fabric Mart Fabric’s website.

Look at how fun the hem looks when worn! This skirt is the most comfortable knit skirt I’ve ever worn.

The asymmetrical neckline is stabilized with fusible stay tape. I used SewKeys woven stay tape, which I purchased from Fabric Mart Fabrics (look in the Sewing Room notions section).

One fabric I picked out had horizontal streaks with one flamingo pink streak. I had originally planned to use it on the front near the skirt. However, as I played around with fabric placement, I liked it on the upper back as it’s a bit of a surprise when you see the back.

Once I was done, I challenged myself to use the scraps to sew a color block tee using McCall’s 8244.

As I mentioned earlier, Fabric Mart has so many knit fabrics available that you can easily find those that work for your own color block creations.

As for me? I know this is a very unique design, but I plan on sewing another one (sleeveless next time) for the upcoming summer months.

SHARON | @thesharonsews